Moreover, Morris’ work in verse was the precise equivalent of his work as a decorative artist, who cared little for easel pictures, and regarded painting as one method out of many for covering wall spaces or other surfaces.[30] His poetry is mainly narrative, but whether epical or lyrical in form, is always less lyric in essence than Rossetti’s.  In its objective spirit and even distribution of emphasis, it contrasts with Rossetti’s expressional intensity very much as Morris’ wall-paper and tapestry designs contrast with paintings like “Beata Beatrix” and “Proserpina.”  Morris—­as an artist—­cared more for places and things than for people; and his interest was in the work of art itself, not in the personality of the artist.

Quite unlike as was Morris to Scott in temper and mental endowment, his position in the romantic literature of the second half-century answers very closely to Scott’s in the first.  His work resembled Scott’s in volume, and in its easiness for the general reader.  For the second time he made the Middle Ages popular.  There was nothing esoteric in his art, as in Rossetti’s.  It was English and came home to Englishmen.  His poetry, like his decorative work, was meant for the people, and “understanded of the people.”  Moreover, like Scott, he was an accomplished raconteur, and a story well told is always sure of an audience.  His first volume, “The Defence of Guenevere” (1858), dedicated to Rossetti and inspired by him, had little popular success.  But when, like Millais, he abandoned the narrowly Pre-Raphaelite manner and broadened out, in “The Life and Death of Jason” (1867) and “The Earthly Paradise” (1868-70), into a fashion of narrative less caviare to the general, the public response was such as met Millais.

Morris’ share in the Pre-Raphaelite movement was in the special field of decorative art.  His enthusiasm for Gothic architecture had been aroused at Oxford by a reading of Ruskin’s chapter on “The Nature of Gothic” in “The Stones of Venice.”  In 1856, acting upon this impulse, he articled himself to the Oxford architect G. E. Street, and began work in his office.  He did not persevere in the practice of the profession, and never built a house.  But he became and remained a connoisseur of Gothic architecture and an active member of the Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings.  His numerous visits to Amiens, Chartres, Reims, Soissons, and Rouen were so many pilgrimages to the shrines of mediaeval art.  Indeed, he always regarded the various branches of house decoration as contributory to the master art, architecture.